Python Eats an Entire Deer in Disturbing Video From Florida

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Thanks to their incredibly flexible jaws, Burmese pythons can eat things that don’t really make sense—like, apparently, an entire white-tailed deer. In fact, while studying the invasive snakes and their impact on the Florida Everglades ecosystem, researchers at the Conservancy of Southwest Florida stumbled across a female python eating a 77-pound deer. The researchers ended up measuring the greatest maximum gape ever recorded in a Burmese python . . . and they also took a gross video.

The scientists published their research about Burmese pythons’ impressive gape, then they shared a video of the deer-eating python on YouTube. In the video, you first see some researchers lying in the grass, watching something. Then, the video zooms up on the python mid-snack. It’s eating the deer whole.

“Watching an invasive apex predator swallow a full-sized deer in front of you is something that you will never forget,” said Ian Bartoszek, a Conservancy of Southwest Florida biologist.

Watch as a Burmese python works on the monumental task of eating an entire white-tailed deer here:

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And here is the conservancy’s Instagram post with additional photos:

Header image courtesy of Ian Bartoszek, Conservancy of Southwest Florida.